Integrate mainline

[p5sagit/p5-mst-13.2.git] / pod / perlmodstyle.pod

diff --git a/pod/perlmodstyle.pod b/pod/perlmodstyle.pod
index 4da7311..558edcf 100644 (file)
--- a/pod/perlmodstyle.pod
+++ b/pod/perlmodstyle.pod
@@ -498,7 +498,7 @@ A contact email address for the author/maintainer
 The level of detail in Perl module documentation generally goes from
 less detailed to more detailed.  Your SYNOPSIS section should contain a
 minimal example of use (perhaps as little as one line of code; skip the
-unusual use cases or or anything not needed by most users); the
+unusual use cases or anything not needed by most users); the
 DESCRIPTION should describe your module in broad terms, generally in
 just a few paragraphs; more detail of the module's routines or methods,
 lengthy code examples, or other in-depth material should be given in 
@@ -588,9 +588,20 @@ using
 
     perl -MExtUtils::MakeMaker -le 'print MM->parse_version(shift)' 'Foo.pm'
 
-If you want to release a 'beta' or 'alpha' version of a module but don't
-want CPAN.pm to list it as most recent use an '_' after the regular
-version number followed by at least 2 digits, eg. 1.20_01
+If you want to release a 'beta' or 'alpha' version of a module but
+don't want CPAN.pm to list it as most recent use an '_' after the
+regular version number followed by at least 2 digits, eg. 1.20_01. If
+you do this, the following idiom is recommended:
+
+  $VERSION = "1.12_01";
+  $XS_VERSION = $VERSION; # only needed if you have XS code
+  $VERSION = eval $VERSION;
+
+With that trick MakeMaker will only read the first line and thus read
+the underscore, while the perl interpreter will evaluate the $VERSION
+and convert the string into a number. Later operations that treat
+$VERSION as a number will then be able to do so without provoking a
+warning about $VERSION not being a number.
 
 Never release anything (even a one-word documentation patch) without
 incrementing the number.  Even a one-word documentation patch should